


To forgive, divine.

by kaffefilter



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Happy Ending?, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-02
Updated: 2014-02-02
Packaged: 2018-01-10 22:09:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,739
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1165124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaffefilter/pseuds/kaffefilter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"And when the righteous man spoke no more, lips forever still on a face pale as snow, then he realized the true nature of his own punishment."</p>
            </blockquote>





	To forgive, divine.

**Author's Note:**

> This came to be in a rush of grief over my own loss. Hopefully it comes across as I want it to. I've been fiddlin with making something more of it, but I'm not sure I should.

It's not the grief that hurts. It's the guilt. Being the one left breathing when His heart has given up. Death is a liberation from pain while Life prides itself on being the constant reminder of your own shortcomings. And Life is merciless. She shoves you into the fray, holding paradise like a carrot over your head so you won't notice that she's carving your heart out through your back.

At least that was how it felt now. Life had been precious to him once; been the only thing worth fighting for. Free will. When you took orders, you knew what you were dying for. The greater good. Guilt was never a feeling his kind knew, because they had never been in the wrong before.

But free will brought mistakes and mistakes taught him guilt. Drowning, bitter, all-consuming guilt. Bringing one bad choice after another; clouding judgement that usually shone clear and undefiled. Life dangled death in his periphery, just out of reach if he ever decided the guilt was too much and wanted out.

But after guilt he was taught forgiveness. The righteous man had taught him. Green eyes saw every bad move he had made, counted them in a mind clouded with anger. Seeming to weigh them against what punishment would be great enough to compass the field of pain he had caused. But the hunter's judgement never came. No skilled hands shot out to smite his traitorous soul, vessel and whatever leftover horror it may be holding. No, the righteous man squared his jaw, tendons visibly straining in his neck while temples fluctuated under the skin as if they beat together with his own accelerated heartbeat.

Then words that hurt tumbled out from broken lips. Things he told himself every waking moment already. But, the hunter told him. There was a "but".

He would make it up to them. Let go of the guilt, it only made him passive. A victim of himself. And he was not allowed to be the focus in this. His dead brothers and sisters in heaven were the victims. The slain humans on the tortured earth, were the victims.  He was the only one able to give their deaths purpose. His wrong could never become a right, but the rest of his existence should be spent trying.

And then the hunter had cried.

You couldn't feel bad for yourself, He told him, it wasn't the way to forgiveness. But others could grieve for your choices, tell you it would all "be alright". You couldn't forgive _yourself_ because then you forgot the pain you had caused, but one person could take the guilt of thousands of deaths and forgive you for them. If you promised to never stop striving for it.

Life had been harder after that. Guilt rose every time he tried to make a choice harder than blinking his eyes or not. Sometimes he brushed it off, made the call and accepted the outcome regardless of how he would feel about it later. But some days it crippled him. Made it impossible to move, as if his lungs were lead and his vessel had grown roots deep in the earth. Times like that was when the warmth enveloped him. Strong arms coaxing him close to a rising and falling chest. A soft mouth whispering encouraging words to his frozen up mind.

"You're strong. So strong, Cas. You don't even know how much I admire you. Every day you make it better, one day at a time we'll make this better. I'm here with you. We'll make it. I've got you."

The righteous man spoke, and Castiel listened. And his mind always thawed from the gentle words. He had become the God his father  had never been. Forever there. Reminding him of his purpose. Of the path they needed to walk, clouded in doubt and uncertainty as it was.

And when the righteous man spoke no more, lips forever still on a face pale as snow, then he realized the true nature of his own punishment. The forgiveness he thought was just out of reach, was never to rear its head again. Guilt was forever his companion. He wanted to be strong again, repeating His words in his mind a hundred times a second until it lulled him into a state of unwilling stillness.

People came and went, their time running its regular course as they mourned and tried to move on. His own grief was perpetual. Before his eyes the grave-pyre never stopped burning; the pain never lessened and eventually he couldn't remember who he had been before. Who he still was. If he was alive anymore? Maybe this was his own hell? Much as the never ending fights of purgatory.

 

When he woke, it was to a hand on his shoulder. His un-seeing eyes shifted back into current time, taking in the overgrown remains of what had been the righteous man's pyre. Grass had sprung out tall and speckled with flowers between what was left of the un-burned wood. It had been fall when he burned.  Winter passes in a blur, as he takes in the memories of the last 6 months and settles into the warmth of the hot spring day. Nothing has ever felt so wrong. He didn't want to ever come back, wanted to stand vigil over the place His body had been returned to the earth. A last testament to the greatness of his soul.

Golden brown eyes met him as he looks up to learn who has woken him.

"Cas." Sam's voice is soft but firm, like his hand on his shoulder. Something un-frozen inside him screams for more. Memories of the warmth an embrace can bring. But never Sam's. No, Sam could never forgive him, could never make this right.

"Come."

The simple command takes minutes to reach his mind. Does he remember how to move? Is there even a purpose to it anymore. Slipping away had been easy, moving is hard. But Sam moves. And he moves; joints cracking in his hips and knees, muscles he's let fade away pumping themselves full of blood again. Pain shoots through every nerve-ending of his vessel and he allows it to wash over him. Physical pain is real, it is precious. A small respite, something to focus on besides the guilt that has come back to rule his world.

"Watch it. Stairs." Sam, still so gentle, opens the door to the bunker. So they are still here. The righteous man had burned outside the only place he had learned to call home. Another wave of pain rolls in as his feet relearn how to handle steps. It washes away memories of comfort that he used to associated with the place. Evenings of warmth, nights of laughter, where the pain hid somewhere inside them for a moment. A brief pause of breath between being hunted and their shared crippling hatred for themselves.

The bunker smells of metal, old books and freshly cooked food. Flashes of dinners together, of Him cooking burgers from scratch, smiling as Cas moaned around a mouthful, chasing away every doubt out of the angel's chest with the creasing of his eyes. But he shouldn't indulge. Memories are not how you atone for your sins. They hold you back from forgiveness, make you painless. And pain felt right, felt easy. Forever trying, watching over the man in his charge. That was his existence now.

Push Sam away, go back up. Go back to the guilt. Back outside, where earth has reclaimed the righteous, and where he needs to be. He wants to try using his voice.  It's dry, unwilling to co-operate. Sounds make it out of him, but they're barely words; just slaughtered remnants of what he wants to say.

"Schhh. It's fine." Sam's hand brushes over his shoulder where it has been resting since the journey inside. He's still walking by his side, towering so tall above. A big hand strokes over the hairs at the back of his neck, stopping to cup the back of his head. No. No, no, no. Touch is memories. Touch is forgiveness. There was no more forgiveness for him as the righteous man died. Pain and guilt; it rolls back around. Marble floors too harsh under his pressure-sensitive feet, but he will not cling to the man pushed so close. 'You are strong, Cas'. No, he deserves the striking pain.

Suddenly, they are still again. By now his muscles are back to being used, being alive, screaming and tearing his vessel back into this nightmare of reality. Blood pumps, he can feel it behind his eyes, in his temples. Standing had been easy, for months he had been the marker of his world's end. The end to his hope for forgiveness. Now standing is hard. Ever which way he leans, it hurts, and the racing of his heart to restart himself pushes tears past his eyelids. Was this how life had been for Sam since his brother's passing? Was his every step as painful and guilt ridden? Sam must be much stronger than he was, to still be alive when the world stopped turning.

Hands big enough to envelop his face, turns his head up from his shoes to the familiar sight of the bunker's kitchen. Nothing has changed inside, it is all the same as before; dull walls and claustrophobic feelings...

"Look at him, Cas."

Except his heart is suddenly twice as big and threatening to stop again. Muscles who keep screaming, drowned in unfamiliar adrenaline, settle for complaining in silence as he force them to go quiet by will alone. His chest, always heavy and squared with guilt, relaxes, releasing tensing grief with a simple roll of his shoulders.

His legs are no longer working, but neither is the painful mantra that kept him listless for such a long time. Instead they are back; Every word He has told him. Every word that he holds dear and memorized but wouldn't let himself have since He no longer lived. Air feels right in his lungs again, breathing has a definite purpose and his mind seems to clear completely from months of rest. Warmth is back in his heart. Grace singing with joy right beneath his skin. And maybe he shouts inwardly to anyone who can hear his thoughts. And maybe some of his kin join in his loud declaration of love.

"The righteous man lives!"


End file.
